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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24117283">fellowship</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonshineandshowers/pseuds/sonshineandshowers'>sonshineandshowers</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Prodigal Son (TV 2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Comedy, Gen, Humor, Mystery</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 15:01:45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,337</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24117283</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sonshineandshowers/pseuds/sonshineandshowers</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Edrisa has a trainee in the morgue who sends her on a search. She wants to know if there's a return policy.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Prodigal Whump Fic Exchange - Spring 2020</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>fellowship</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrenchcoatRats/gifts">TrenchcoatRats</a>.</li>



    </ul><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>TrenchcoatRats requested some Edrisa.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>Step. Step. Step.</p><p>Where was it?</p><p>Straight from the scene and into Edrisa’s morgue, the process repeated so many times it was ritual — she could do it with her eyes closed.</p><p>She needed to get her trainee to the same point.</p><p>That’s where the difficulty came in.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>Why did she have to have a trainee?</p><p>“Because you were a student once, too,” her boss had reminded.</p><p>He was not wrong. She also didn’t disagree with the concept on paper. Fellowship enabled apprenticing with a medical examiner, field work — all part of getting certified.</p><p>She just wished her trainee was more meticulous. Studious. Focused on every detail so she wouldn’t need to cross his <em>T</em>s and dot his <em>I</em>s.</p><p>She wanted to poke his out with toothed forceps.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“It might be under here,” Will indicated, lifting the corner of an instrument cart.</p><p>Why was he talking?</p><p>“Do you have any idea the disrespect you’ve shown?” Edrisa blurted.</p><p>“It’s not like I dropped his liver or something,” Will rebutted.</p><p>Edrisa let out a series of squeaks and beeps, at a loss of how to get through his thick skull that he was incompetent.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>Why couldn’t her boss have given her a live one?</p><p>“I don’t know what happened. It was wet. It just…slipped,” Will babbled.</p><p>“Suppose you were on the table, Dr. Collins,” Edrisa put him in the hot seat. “Most of the body has fluid. Would you appreciate it if a trainee lost part of you?”</p><p>“It’s here somewhere — I didn’t lose it. And it wasn’t part of him!” he defended.</p><p>“Every bit on the table should be treated like it is!” her ire escaped in a screech.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>Nowhere under the full autopsy table. Not up by the gallery or near her cabinets. Presumably not in any of the places Will had been pattering around.</p><p>But she should probably double-check.</p><p>How did he make it through medical school and residency with those hands? Was he not cut out to be a doctor on live people, so deceased was his second choice?</p><p>That sounded strikingly similar.</p><p>Was he anxious or something? Or a different style from her — a big picture guy?</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>Couldn’t she have gotten someone stellar like Bright?</p><p>Had he ever considered forensic science? Why didn’t he get his doctorate in psychology? Did he try but fail?</p><p>Bright never failed at anything.</p><p>He failed to come see her after Endicott had landed on her table.</p><p>Was he avoiding her?</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“Dr. Tanaka, I’ve looked everywhere,” Will reported.</p><p>“Do you have it in your hands?” Edrisa asked between gritted teeth.</p><p>“No, but — “</p><p>“Then you haven’t. Keep looking.”</p><p>Was there a warranty period to send a trainee back?</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>She looked in the back corner where Malcolm had hidden in the shadows while they discussed Mr. Smith.</p><p>Nothing.</p><p>Looked a second time where she had hugged him and begged him not to die.</p><p>Nothing.</p><p>Checked by the door he passed through every time he came to see her, the very swing putting her on alert.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“I’ve got it,” Edrisa yelled across the room. “Bring me forceps and a specimen dish.”</p><p>Will quickly completed the task as asked. One thing right.</p><p>Edrisa picked up the fallen object from the corner of the floor between the door and the wall.</p><p>“Skidded pretty good, huh?” Will commented.</p><p>“Enough,” Edrisa said firmly, cutting off the chance of anything disrespectful coming out of his mouth.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>Blue and purple swirled back and forth on the walk back to the table.</p><p>“That’s a first for me,” Will shared.</p><p>“Better be the last,” Edrisa warned.</p><p>“The marbles, I mean. Why are they in the victim’s stomach?”</p><p>“That’s for the detectives to tell us.” Or maybe even a consultant.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p><em>He lost his marbles</em>, she thought of sharing the story with Bright.</p><p><em>Fastest shooter in autopsy</em>.</p><p><em>Winner of the medical examiner’s marble olympics</em>.</p><p>Would he laugh? Want to see it? Look over the frosted orb to meet her eyes so she’d get lost in light cerulean? Or would they tint green?</p><p>She never could tell what morgue lighting would do.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>It wasn’t helping Will’s pallor. Maybe it was nervousness leading to his mistakes after all.</p><p>“Start a report on the incident,” Edrisa directed, pointing to the door to rid her space of the trainee.</p><p>“But there’s more work,” he reminded. Like the one who was in charge forgot.</p><p>“We’ll continue when you’re done,” she assured.</p><p>Finally, her morgue was a solitary operation again.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>Sitting alone with Mr. Sampson, Edrisa shared her apologies. “He’s learning, sir,” she explained to the man on the table. “Hopefully this experience was enough to teach him not to be dropsy again.”</p><p>It probably wasn’t, but she would try. If he failed, it would be a reflection on his teacher.</p><p>She looked at what work they had left to do and gathered her patience to attempt to mold her trainee into a respectable medical examiner.</p><p>“We’ll do all we can to figure out who did this to you,” she told Mr. Sampson. The promise she could offer versus the more definitive <em>we’ll figure it out</em>. Sometimes they didn’t.</p><p>There were so many marbles, they could have stood up flowers in his stomach. A bushy bouquet of spring wildflowers to grace the morgue. Something brighter than the grey.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>Did Bright like flowers?</p><p>Should she get him some?</p><p>Would it be enough to apologize for whatever reason he hadn’t set foot in her morgue again?</p><p>What color said friend? Just wanna see your face again, you silly guy? Top of the rollercoaster to you, you’re in for a wild ride?</p><p>Yellow, perhaps. Just like Sunshine.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“Who sent you a sunflower?” Dani said, Malcolm looking to his desk where a single foot-wide head took up the corner.</p><p>He cocked his head. Different.</p><p>“Someone trying to feed your bird brain?” JT joked.</p><p>“Hey,” Malcolm complained. “Gil said this brain is essential for this case.”</p><p>“Let’s get over to Edrisa.” Gil exited his office. “You can thank her for the flower.” He read over Malcolm’s shoulder.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>“Edrisa, really?” Dani commented on the way out the door.</p><p>“Says thank you for being a friend,” Malcolm shared.</p><p>“Uhhuh,” JT added, stirring the pot.</p><p>“Gil?” Malcolm looked for backup.</p><p>“I’ll let you get nice and pink first,” Gil teased, patting between his shoulders as the other two snickered. “And then tell them yes, that’s what the card said.”</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“I wouldn’t mix personal with work,” Malcolm told them.</p><p>“Bro, work is the only place you <em>go</em>,” JT pointed out.</p><p>“I have a great home life with a gal named Sunshine.”</p><p>“Really?” JT’s eyes grew wider, not believing he had met someone new already, Gil waving his hand at his neck to cut it out and Dani snickering.</p><p>“She’s my parakeet,” Malcolm got JT back, enjoying a smile at his expense.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>“Mr. Bright!” Edrisa exclaimed when they entered the morgue. Gil gave her a look to turn it down a thousand notches.</p><p>“The <em>Helianthus annuus</em> brought some sunshine to my day,” Malcolm shared with her. “Thank you.”</p><p>“Glad to see you’re back!”</p><p>"Took some time off," Malcolm indicated.</p><p>“Edrisa,” Gil nudged, pointing toward the body.</p><p>ᖲ ᖲ ᖲ</p><p>“Has anyone lost their marbles?” Edrisa started and Gil groaned at the joke.</p><p>“Dr. Collins is going to tell you about our victim.” And at all of their looks, she added. “He’s my new fellowship trainee. Be nice.”</p><p>Because if she couldn’t swap him out, she’d at least put him to work. Maybe he was someone else Gil could redirect.</p><p>To Edrisa’s dismay, Will fumbled through the report, trying to find the right page to start on. </p><p>Or maybe he was a lost cause. Only time would tell which.</p><p>ᖱ ᖱ ᖱ</p><p>
  <em>fin</em>
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